BSH 



EARLY AND LATE 



KATHARINE WARREN 




Class 

Book._n_ 
Copyright N^_- 



CIIEOUGHT OEFOSm 



EARLY AND LATE 



EARLY AND LATE 



By 
KATHARINE WARREN 




New York. 
DUFFIELD & COMPANY 

1921 






^^A-v 3 



Copyright, 1931, by 
DUFFIELD AND COMPANY 



NOV 16 1921 



PRIKTED IN U. S. A. 



n 



To 
MY MOTHER 



CONTENTS 

Songs — page 

March Crocuses 3 

Spring Bonfires 4 

The Evening Wind 5 

Autumn Song 6 

Frost Song 7 

The Willow Tree 8 

There Should be Roses 9 

Intaglio 10 

From Pointed Tips 11 

Moths 12 

If You Could Know 13 

Hours 14 

O Rose of Yesterday . . . , 15 

No More 16 

O Yet Remember 17 

Content 18 

The Door (By W. B. Yeats) 19 

Song 20 

The Street 21 

Road Song 22 

Remembrance — 

Remembrance 25 

Three Sonnets — 

A Sonnet of Work 33 

Dreams 34 

On Growing Old (By John Masefield) ... 35 

All Souls' Eve — 

All Souls' Eve 39 

Mother of Pity 41 

Vigil 42 

[vii] 



CONTENTS 

PAGB 

The Sick Room — Night 44 

Afternoon 46 

Morning 48 

The Middle Ground — 

The Middle Ground 51 

The Lesson 52 

The Candle 53 

Henceforth 54 

Which Hand? 55 

Acknowledgment 56 

Enough 57 

Crucifix 58 

Monte Mottarone 59 

The Far Island 60 

The Mid-Day Moon 61 

The Plum Tree 62 

November 63 

Your Daughter 64 

The Distant Kinsman 65 

The Tidal Pond — 

Spectrum 69 

Dark Moon 70 

Closed Gentians 71 

Study in White 72 

Nocturne 73 

The Garden 74 

Grafted 76 

Blazed 78 

Inscribed 80 

Beech Trees — October 81 

Surprise 82 

Shore Nocturne 83 

The Tidal Pond 84 

[ viii ] 



A few of these poems appeared first in The 
Atlantic Monthly, The Century Magazine, 
The Dial, Harper s Magazine, The Texas 
Review, and The Vassar Quarterly; and in 
Treasured Nature Lyrics, edited by Alice W. 
Wilcox, and published by Richard G. Bad- 
ger. The author is grateful for permission 
to republish. 



SONGS 



[11 



MARCH CROCUSES 

O golden joy, you are too early here. 

Half hid in trails of snow your heads appear, 

The only sign of springtime drawing near. 

Yet could you now, I think you would not go 
And be as blossoms are that never know 
The chill pure freshness of new-fallen snow. 



[3] 



SPRING BONFIRES 

Blue films of smoke from last year's leaves. 

Breathing and vanishing. 
Blow through the softly budding boughs 

Where this year's leaves shall spring. 

Shall these, another April, loose 

So faint, so keen a sting? 
Such subtle warmth upon the cheek 

Breathing and vanishing? 



[4] 



THE EVENING WIND 

The quiet dusk is broken through 
With cool and rushing sound. 

Some swift-winged Presence passes by, 
For farther darkness bound. 

From out my heart are shaken swift 
The day's delight and dole. 

The garment of my life slips off 
And leaves my naked soul. 

My soul has choked in others' dust, 
My soul has deeply sinned, 

But this one hour it walks alone. 
And pure as evening wind. 



[5] 



AUTUMN SONG 

By every berry on the briar. 

By every fruit on the tree, 
By glint of sun on every sheaf 

Sorrow comes back to me. 

So deep her eyes, so cool her cheek, 
So bright her bending head 

My heart cries toward her, and forgets 
How long she has been dead. 



[6] 



FROST SONG 

There fell deep frost last night 

That had been dew before. 
By that same freshness they had lived upon 

The flowers are stricken sore. 

Blackened and sunk, they heed 

No sun-warm after hours. 
Alas, the touch of love's dark-changed dew! 

Alas, my flower of flowers! 



[7] 



THE WILLOW TREE 

Wind in the willow branches 
Against the cloud-strown blue: 

The flowing of green water 
With ripples running through. 

Flowing and falling water 
With whispering lights agleam. 

Ah, they that lie beneath it. 
How softly must they dream. 



[8] 



THERE SHOULD BE ROSES 

There should be roses over you, beloved, 

Where only grass has grown; 
Odor of roses, and the thrushes' singing 

Where weeping winds have blown. 

The year will bring the fragrance and the singing, 

And sunlit blooms shall start 
Above the grass, but only wind and weeping 

Will stir within my heart. 



[9] 



INTAGLIO 

Clear graven in the substance of my heart 

Your face I see, 
An inwrought and inevitable part 

Of life for me. 

And nevermore may any touch of fate 

Those lines dispel 
Unless at once it shall obliterate 

My heart as well. 



[10] 



FROM POINTED TIPS 

From pointed tips of grapevine leaves 

The dewdrops hang in rows. 
Over dark hilltops, in the east 

The flush of morning grows. 
The fresh clear chill of early dawn 

Makes sweet the waiting air, — 
/ would the evening would not come^ 

For with it comes despair. 

The trees against the pure pale sky 

Huge, black and massive loom. 
Shrill insect notes fall droningly 

From out their whispering gloom. 
In ebbing crimson of the west 

The star of evening burns. — 
/ would the morning would not come^ 

For with it hope returns. 



[11] 



MOTHS 

They dash with desperate soft flutterings 

Against the window pane. 
Within, white splendor waits for foolish wings, 

A heaven to attain. 

Thou Power that lightest luring candle fires 

To flicker fierce and sweet, 
Keep close against my winged wild desires 

The casement where they beat. 



[12] 



IF YOU COULD KNOW 

If you could know that you would die 

Before the set of sun, 
I well know where you straight would fare, 

As you have always done. 

I know whose breast your head would rest, 
Whose lips on yours make moan, 

Whose clinging arms would hold you back. 
It would not be my own. 

If I could know that I should die 

Before the set of sun, 
I well know where I straight would fare, 

As I have never done. 

I would not care though you were there 

With her I have not known. 
I would possess my eyes of you. 

Then go to die alone. 

[13] 



HOURS 

Time told away those hours like any others. 

Beads on his rosary are all one to him 
Though they be painted gay with rainbow colors 

Or with heart's blood and tears be stained and 
dim. 

Then in his gaunt, inexorable fingers 

He took the one that, day by endless day, 

I watched with failing heart fall nearer — nearer. 
With aching gaze that could not turn away. 

Like any common one at last he dropped it. 
And many more since then — I know not how; 

Nor if the thought of it made life more drear) 
Before he slipped it down the string, or now. 



[14] 



O ROSE OF YESTERDAY 

O rose of yesterday. 
What cruel wind hath so despoiled thy sweet, 
And strewn thy silken petals at my feet 
Saddening the dust wherein I take my way ? 

O rose of yesterday, 
I know not if my heart should be more sad 
To see thee spent and scattered, or more glad 
Still to remember thee who couldst not stay, 

O rose of yesterday. 



[IS] 



NO MORE 

Love came and called me 

At break of day. 
I rose and followed 

Close on his way. 

Found now a footprint, 
Heard now a call, 

Saw now a shadow. 
Flagged not at all. 

No more I follow. 

Twilight is gray. 
Let me not find him 

At close of day! 



116] 



O YET REMEMBER 

O yet remember me 
A little while! Like violets in the grass, 
A mist of pale sweet color as you pass, 
A breath of odor drawn half consciously, 

So think a while of me. 

But soon forget again. 
As violets vanish when the summer's bloom 
Is deepest, and the summer's rich perfume 
Fills all the air, that needs no violets then. 

Let memory fade again. 



[17] 



CONTENT 

Serene and slow they come and go, 

The even, happy days. 
My spirit walks in still content 

Its long-accustomed ways. 

And yet sometimes I know not what 

Creeps up into my thought 
Of dim desire and vague regret, — 

Pale shades that stand for naught. 

Desire that knows not what it seeks. 

Unless it be the far 
Clear path whereon the young west wind 

Trysts with the evening star. 

Regret that knows not what it mourns, 

Unless it be the fall 
Of petals from the quince tree blooms, 

Beside the garden wall. 

[18] 



THE DOOR 

(W. B. Yeats.) 

In the gray midst of the world there came an open 
door, 

O my heart was lifted high, that had lain low be- 
fore, — 

Lifted, drunk with song, my heart that sings no 
more. 

A voice came from there, and loud and low it sung 
Of green buds breaking, in years still young. 
With sound of running water in my far heart it 
rung. 

Then sprang a wind, and shut to the door 
In the gray midst of the world. I hear the song 
no more. 



[19] 



SONG 

O Song is a blowing wind 

That fareth to and fro. 
One hour it lifteth on its wings 

And one it leaveth low. 

O Song is a leaping flame 

That pauseth here or there, 
And some men*s lips are touched with fire, 

But my shut mouth is bare. 

Let that sweet wind blow far 
And that wild flame burn free. 

And let the singing lips be glad. 
My hour sufficeth me. 



[20] 



THE STREET 

It runs east and v/est. 
Its gray old walls are high. 
Dust lies on its stones 
And wheels go grating by. 

But east and west it runs, 
With its strip of sky above, 
To the rising of the sun 
And the going down thereof. 



[21] 



ROAD SONG 

O where goes the bare road 

That climbs up so high 
Over the green hilFs shoulder bare. 

And stops in the sky? 

The clear winds, the clean winds 

That blow far and fair, 
Blow, and behold all ends of earth. 

Do they know where ? 

The cloud shade that floats slow 

Across hill and fell 
Goes with the sunshine down the day. 

Can their speech tell? 

O where goes the high road. 

So gray as it goes 
Under the starlight all night long? 

O where, who knows ? 

[22] 



REMEMBRANCE 



[23] 



REMEMBRANCE 

Thou wilt perforce forget y when I am gone. 
Swift eve on eve and drifting dawn on dawn 
Shall blur thy clear remembrance line by line 
Till dimness shall grow blank. No thought of thine 
Shall long for me or seek me out or heed 
My darkness. Then shall I be dead indeed. 

Thou saidst it, pitiful meanwhile of my tears. 
Swift days on days and years on drifting years 
Have fled since thou didst pass beyond the door 
That will not let thee forth forevermore; 
And I have learned the wisdom of thy thought. 
The spirit's wings in fate's strong hands are caught. 
The living, if they will or no, must live; 
And even a crippled life account must give, 
Or suffer that dishonorable death. 
The drawing of unserviceable breath. 



[25] 



REMEMBRANCE 

Work, stern deliverer, binds the broken soul, 

Urges the fainting will, with strong control 

Steadies the staggering feet, and leads at length 

Upward by blood-tracked, rocky ways to strength. 

Little by little, in the warming sun 

A narrow foothold upon peace is won. 

Last, the sharp path to joy is trod, and then 

The winds of life blow ceacelessly again 

And days on days go by when I forget. 

Alas, thou knewest truth. And yet — and yet — 

Ah, never can the voice or step of spring 
Sound in the garden of thy cherishing 
But thou art present there, thy living face 
Lit with the joy enkindled in the place. 
Thy full hands happy, making earth more fair. 
And I am glad of spring, to have thee there. 
And glad of all things that can speak of thee: 
The iris by the wall, blue gleams of sea 
Beyond the tawny shimmer of salt grass, 

[26] 



REMEMBRANCE 



Odors from white-foot showers that fleetly pass, 
The small rough road where shadbush lifts on high 
Its tremulous shining dreams against the sky. 
The solemn purple hills where sunsets flow 
And ebb, and starry glories come and go. 

Nor only beauty's touch, nor joy alone. 
Nor wonted ways, can bring thee to thine own. 
For when the thought of thee has long been far 
And hid, as in the clouds a throbbing star, 
Some unremembering thing, some stranger's look 
Or half caught word, some open-fluttering book, 
Some sound of distant bells — and thou art there: 
Thine eyes, thy smile, thy softly tumbled hair, 
Thy voice, thy hand whereon my cheek may lean. 
Clear as though years had never rolled between; 
Clear as this faithful pain that ever waits 
Thy sure return, nor alters nor abates — 
A deep still pool some sudden wind has shown 
Beneath the leaves upon its surface strown. 



[27] 



REMEMBRANCE 



And sometimes, at my work or rest, I hear 

The footfall of thy spirit drawing near; 

And tarrying, thou foldest me about 

With love, and all my goings in and out 

With closest understanding, as of old. 

Then am I warmed and fed, that had been cold 

And hungry at the heart. With thee beside 

All pain is stilled and longing satisfied. 

And I so blessedly companioned 

Almost the while believe thou art not dead. 

Beyond that closed door where thou dost rest 
With darkness folded deep about thy breast, 
Wouldst thou indeed be lightened of its weight 
Could I with every early breath and late 
Draw thoughts of thee, and count no moment fair 
That doth not on its heart thy likeness wear? 
I cannot know. Life's current runs too strong 
For such as I. But where thou waitest long, 
Though naught of outward things thou mayest 
mark, 

[28] 



REMEMBRANCE 



Doth not a sweetness sometimes stir thy dark? 
Doth not thy love, surmounting death, divine 
The deepest lifeblood in this heart of mine, — 
Through all forgetting so thine own that I 
Must still perforce remember till I die. 



[29] 



THREE SONNETS 



131] 



A SONNET OF WORK 

Whereto our labor and our bitter sweat? 

The seed we sow we trample in the dark. 

The flame we strike— our own tears quench the 

spark. 
The white that we would purify we set 
Our grimy print upon. And we forget 
Thy ways and thoughts are not as ours, and hark 
Toward what we take to be some heavenly mark, 
And find we serve the devil to abet. 

Then do Thou blind us, that we may not see 
The measure of our own futility, 
Lest seeing we should cease to work, and die. 
Or give us sight, that we may know thereby 
How through our labor, whatso end it meet, 
We reach toward Thee who knowest no defeat. 



[33] 



DREAMS 

When, aeons past, this cool green earth was led 
A slackening fire athwart the deeps of space, 
And shape first quivered on its molten face, 
Did any dream disturb that substance dread — 
Not of our whelming life today outspread, 
But of that primal spawn that sprang apace 
And throbbing out, to finer forms gave place, 
Wherefrom the seed of Adam last was bred ? 

First clay, then life, then spirit, — so came we. — 

We dream of spirit gloriously won 

To uses all divine. — O may it be 

The ages shall surpass our dream aflame 

As our commingled being has outrun 

Earth's unremembered dream from which we came. 



[34] 



JOHN MASEFIELD 



On Growing Old 

Be with him. Beauty, even as he prays, 
When ail his power and splendor of life are over. 
Let him have wisdom and passion all his days 
Who has ever been your remembering following 
lover. 

Forget not him, but O, remember too 

The unhappy who have lost you, or never known 

you; 
Whose fire has gone out in smother of smoke, or 

who 
Live walled in stone from the light that should 

have shown you. 



[3S] 



JOHN MASI^KIKFJ) 



\n the old years, the l)arc years, what wll! there 

l)c iar tficni ? 
Passion and wisdom and all that you would be 

giving 
They cannot see. liut brush the luminous hem 
Of your raiment over them. Let them dream they 

arc living. 

Let them know that you are, for a moment. Ay, 
Let them even behold your face, and die. 



136] 



ALL SOULS' EVE 



[37] 



ALL SOULS' EVE 

Mother, I've barred the shutters close. 
The wind is loud and wild. — 

Nor bar nor shutter on this night 

Will keep it out, my child. 

Mother, what makes you shiver so ? 
The fire is quick and warm. — 

I hear the voices of the damned 

That cry upon the storm. 

Mother, why come they out tonight 

To ride upon the wind ? — 

This one night they have leave to go 
And pray where once they sinned. 

Mother, sure never sinner's soul 
Has need of coming here. — 

O hush, my child, and let me be. 

The wind is passing near. 

[39] 



ALL SOULS' EVE 



Mother, what sobbed across the floor? 

What was it shuddered so? 

O, I am feared, you strain so white 
And stare so wide with woe. 

What was it wailed beside the lire? 

O hold me in your arm. — 
Alas, it was the soul of one 
That wrought us deadly harm. 

Mother, then is he not in hell 
And burning, heart and limb ? — 
God knows he is, but would to God 
That I were there with him. 



[ 40 



MOTHER OF PITY 

I bring three candles to thy shrine 
And set them burning clear. 

I bow my forehead to the stones. 
Mother of Pity, hear! 

All day I go to feed thy poor, 

And yet no peace I find 
For hearing how his swinging step 

Seems ever close behind. 

Long though I gaze upon the Cross 

I see but his dark head. 
I kiss thy robe, and feel his kiss 

Upon my mouth instead. 

Mother of Pity, all whose ways 

In crystal calm are set, 
Since thou wilt have me not forgive 

Let me but once forget! 

(411 



VIGIL 

Their footsteps down the passage die 

And I am left alone. 
He who in life was never mine 

Is now an hour my own. 

Ah God, how white the throat and cheek 

That were so ruddy brown ! 
But bright across those clustered curls 

The candle-light gleams down. 

His eyes, that shot so keen a glance — 
One thing they did not see. — 

If I should kiss your close-shut eyes 
Would you be wroth with me? 



[42] 



VIGIL 



If I should kiss your quiet mouth — 

You would not feel nor care, 
Unless indeed it made you dream 

Some other's kiss lay there. . . . 

I cannot take what was not mine 
When you were scarce so cold 

The steps draw near. Now let them come, 
And let me now grow old ! 



[43] 



THE SICK ROOM 

I 

NIGHT 

When I waken in the night 
And cannot sleep at all, 
Along the house-filled street 
I hear a strange sound fall. 

A strange sound, for the town, 
From the little town park 
At the end of the street — 
A fox*s wild short bark. 

He wakens in his cage 
And sees in the night 
The brilliant close-cut sward 
And the sharp electric light 

[44] 



THE SICK ROOM 



In place of the starred dark 
Over pastures that he knew, 
The tangled, dripping grass, 
And sweet fern gray with dew. 

Were I a man again 

I would go stealthily 

With drug or with shot. 

In the night, and set him free. 

We dream in the night 
And we waken, he and I. — 
The cage must have its way 
Till the thing within die. 



[45] 



THE SICK ROOM 

II 

AFTERNOON 

As I lie here in bed 
The dull trampling beat 
Of horses two and two 
Comes up from the street 

Of horses step and step 
And wheels rolling slow. 
They come and they pass. 
And I well know where they go. 

They come and they pass 
In the early afternoon. 
They go the one way, 
And well I know that soon 

[46] 



THE SICK ROOM 



Come rain or come shine 

They will go that way once more. 

In the early afternoon 

They will start from my door. 



[47] 



THE SICK ROOM 

III 

MORNING 

I hope that I shall know when the moment comes 

So I can be glad. 
I think it will bring me that clear sharpness of joy 

I have never had 

To slip past the edge of sense, to fling off the old 

Worn garb of distress 
And poise an instant naked and free, then plunge 

Into nothingness. 



[48] 



THE MIDDLE GROUND 



[49] 



THE MIDDLE GROUND 

They stood and sang of grief that comes 
In all men*s hearts to dwell — 

The young, that knew not what it meant. 
The old, that knew too well. 

And I that am not young nor old 

Sat still when they had sung 
And shrank from growing old, and yet 

Would not again be young. 



[51] 



THE LESSON 

I stand all tired and dull against Thy knee. 
The words are very hard Thou pointest me 
My eyes are blurred with tears. I cannot see, 
But stumble on uncomprehendingly. 

This page is hard, — so hard to read and know; 
And I have tried so long, and stained it so. 
Another one would find me not so slow. 
Wouldst Thou but turn it now, and let it go! 



[52] 



THE CANDLE 

My candle flame in the wind, 
Like a bright moth fluttering, 

Stricken and tossed and torn 
To the wick anew will cling. 

I will fend the gusts with my hand 
From the gallant tortured thing, 

I will let it be still and burn 
With pure and lambent wing. 



[53] 



HENCEFORTH 

Henceforth I will let lie my open hand 
And never any more will clasp or cling. 
Never again will say "It is my own" 
Of anything. 

Whatever will shall rest within my hold. 
Whatever will shall pass unchecked away. 
Who hath not kept himself, he may not ask 
That aught should stay. 



[54] 



WHICH HAND? 

Life said, "Come choose! Which hand contains 

your prize?" 
I wavered long between the left and right, 
Then chose, and laughing at my eager eyes 
He spread two empty palms before my sight. 



[55] 



ACKNOWLEDGMENT 

I thank thee. Fate, who holdest back from me 

The thing I long for most 
And straight would seize, against high Heaven*s 
demur 

Although my soul were lost. 

I needs must go with heart that burns in vain. 

Secure and desolate, 
And plod through dust, who might have horsed 
on flame. — 

And so I thank thee. Fate. 



[56] 



ENOUGH 

I have caught the droppings from the cup 

That others drink full deep. 
I have had but crumbs from off the board 

Where surfeited they sleep. 

Yet even so my share is more 

Than all I am denied. 
I know the taste of bread and wine. 

And I am satisfied. 



[57] 



CRUCIFIX 

This carven ivory makes symbol, wrought 

With painful perfect art, 
How every day I scourge and crucify 

The God within my heart. 

But symbol incomplete, for all my days 

Within my heart record 
How evermore he rises from the dead, — 

That slain yet living Lord. 



[58] 



iMONTE MOTTARONE 

As we came down from the top of the world. 

On that bleak mountainside 
A little girl sat all alone 

And watched us, steady-eyed. 

In that remote grave innocence 

I who but now had known 
A universe of snow-still peaks. 

And had not seemed alone, 

Saw earth slip suddenly away 

And space before it roll. 
And felt eternity enwrap 

My solitary soul. 



[59 J 



THE FAR ISLAND 

Where the sun went down in the sea 
Out of cloud, out of naught it came, 

Suddenly painted black 
On the sullen flame. 

Mountain and tower and town 

Risen out of the deep, 
Stranger than any shore 

In the seas of sleep. 

Strange as an unguessed isle 
In the heart sprung suddenly 

And vanishing swift again 
In night and the sea. 



[60] 



THE MID-DAY MOON 

Last night the new moon in the west 

Went delicately bright 
Along the primrose slopes of heaven, 

The darkling world*s delight. 

Today, a wisp of shredded cloud 

Upon the sun-blue air 
She strays, a lost and lonely wraith. 

And no one marks her there. 

Thou too, O Memory, so wan 
While day my vision fills, 

Shalt light again, ineffable, 
My spirit*s evening hills. 



[61] 



THE PLUM TREE 

Through dreary purlieus of the town 

The rattling car clangs on, 
And blackened stone and brick are all 

That eyes may rest upon. 

Then suddenly a miracle — 
A wraith of branched white, 

A tiny plum tree lifting up 
Its delicate delight. 

A moment seen amid the smoke. 
Then gone like snowflakes blown. 

But down the dull disheartened streets 
Where never flower has blown 

Its fragile grace still haunts the air 

By every dingy wall. — 
Ah, Love, who bringest stones to bloom, 

Blow white within us all I 

[62] 



NOVEMBER 

Yellow and russet have fallen. 
But the branches I thought bare 

Lift crowding little brown buds 
Into the steel-hard air. 

I too will let my leaves go. 
And strip for the buffeting, 

And I will have buds ready 
If there should come a spring. 



[63] 



YOUR DAUGHTER 

She is herself, till speaking leisurely 

She turns, and then 
You who are ever present in my heart 

Are here again. 

But O, you look on me with eyes so young, 

So clear, so cold, 
And wonder why you held me dear,and mark 

How I am old. 



[64] 



THE DISTANT KINSMAN 

Old stranger with familiar eyes. 
What have you done to me 
Who thought myself remote from you 
As the utmost frozen sea? 

Up from the unknown roots of life 
Blind memories grope with pain. 
And ancient thoughts that are not mine 
Steal ghostly through my brain. 

dead and gone for half a life 
Is he whose eyes you keep. — 

1 do not know how far blood tells. 
But I know it runs full deep. 



[65 1 



THE TIDAL POND 



167] 



SPECTRUM 

Beyond the darkening of violet. 

The vanishing of red 

Lurk unknown colors, subtler, more exquisite. 

Invisible. 

I will brush my eyes with star-beams, 

I will drench them with dew 

Till I can glimpse that farther, finer beauty. 



[69] 



DARK MOON 

Unseen circle 

Glimmer-edged upon the darkness, 

Clasped by the palely-bright 

Heavy-hanging crescent. 

When you are spread with shining. 

Charged with singing light from rim to rim 

What shall I dream of? 

What shall I pray for? 



[70] 



CLOSED GENTIANS 

Perhaps some god 

Sealed your blue-purple rounded tips. 

That none other might discern 

The loveliness within. 

Perhaps Proserpina 

Set your clusters with sharp leaves 

And muted you. 

Weaving a wreath for her pain 

In the shades. 

Perhaps your own souls 
Closed your mouths upon a passion 
Whose hurt and sweetness burn 
Through the deep color of your mourning. 



[71] 



STUDY IN WHITE 

A white cyclamen by the window 

Poising its blooms 

Against the soft loose whiteness of fog 

And the dense whiteness of snow-contoured earth. 

Then suddenly 

The fog full of wild petals fluttering, 

And the blossoms delicately carven in cold snow. 



[72] 



NOCTURNE 

Halfway down the garden path. 

Where all the colors — 

Larkspur, mangolds, poppies — 

Are folded deep in shadow, 

One wide white rose breaks from the sheathing 

dusk 
And rests there 
Luminous and pale, 
A bodied fragrance. 

So pale, so luminous 

Your face 

Breaks through the darkness of my memory. 



[73] 



THE GARDEN 

There is no dial here. 
The old red cedar post of the grape arbor 
Throws a clear slant shadow across the gravel path 
And moves it slowly around the hours. 

There is no pool here. 

Only the salt smell of the inlet 

Stirs through the hollyhocks, 

And sinks out behind the raspberry canes 

In the warmth under the wall. 

There is no stone bench 
Nor any manner of wooden one, 
For there is much to do — 
To thin long lines of curling lettuces 
And red-stemmed beets. 
To cut thick shoots of close-tipped asparagus. 
To tie the extravagances of bean runners 
And gather crisp pale green pea pods 
And the richest crimsons of strawberries. 

[74] 



THE GARDEN 

Then the back straightens. — 

The little clambering roses are flinging their 

flushes 
High over the wall, 
Or an egg-plant droops more heavily 
Its blackish-purple polished v/eight, 
Or the pink-slashed peony buds loosen their white 

feathers 
In the sun 

There is no wish for a dial here. 

Nor for any manner of bench set by a pool. 



[75] 



GRAFTED 

From my place by the orchard wall 

I look across the near fields 

To a wild apple tree 

Growing by the bank of a brook. 

I too was a wild seedling. 

Men planted me here. 

Lopped my branches, 

Cleft the ends and set them with scions. 

They spread forth mightily 

Bearing delicate apples. 

Large, mild-flavored. 

Rosy-fair among the dull green leaves. 



[76] 



GRAFTED 



Yet I look across to the wild apple. 

How would it be to have grown in a rough pasture, 

Neighbored by dark cedars 

And fragrant bayberry. 

And old gray rocks 

That rains have smoothed and lichens roughened ? 

To stretch deep roots down to the running water. 

Thrust them through the fissures of a rock, 

Clasp them around its curving base ? 

To break out in a myriad bristling twigs 

Ignorant of the pruning knife? 

To swarm with a myriad tiny apples 

Full of sharp juices, 

Crowding along the branch 

Brilliant as a garland of flowers? 

I too was once a wilding. 



[77] 



BLAZED 

I stood tall and straight among the others, 

Glad in my lithe swaying, 

In the stirring of my light-piled masses of needles 

Lifted high into the blue day 

And the blue night, 

In the rose and purple hovering through the deep 

wood gloom 
Over the warm brown of my stem. 

Then — 

Two sharp steel strokes downward, 

Two upward — 

And again — 

Shattering to my farthest branches. 

A bright wound breaking my smooth shaft, 

Bleeding. 

There is no healing it, 
There is no hiding it. 

[ 78] 



BLAZED 



Men come by, searching anxiously, wearily. 
Their eyes fall upon it, and brighten. 
They cry out, rejoicing. 
And go their way. 

What has my wound to do with them 
And the way they go? 
Only I can feel it 
Bleeding. 



[79] 



INSCRIBED 

No — no! — 

I am not young any longer. 

Pain like this should not reach me. 

I have grown a strong close bark, 

Layer on layer 

Enfolding the inner fibres 

And the channels where sap flows. 

A close tough bark. 

Only the axe, I thought, could cleave through 

To the running currents of life. 

But this small sharp knife. 
Tracing along those letters 
Carved so long ago, 
Has sunk deep into the groove 
Between the rough scarred edges. 

Hasten, summers and winters ! 

Roll the edges together and knit them across. 

Then the knife will pierce no more. 

Then only the axe will cleave through. 

[80] 



BEECH TREES— OCTOBER 

On the blue air 

These tall stems print in delicate clean lines 

Their unstained gray, 

And their pale, loose-flung yellow of leaves, 

Clear-textured, pure-pointed, 

Washed here or there with auburn, — 

Shaped sunlight of evening 

Held from darkness for a moment. 



[81] 



SURPRISE 

A small box from the post. 

String, paper undone. 

The tin cover lifted — 

Bright-leafed twigs within, and scraps of moss — 

About me, up to the fire-blue sky, 
In sun and silence 

Slopes the mighty shoulder of a mountain 
Arrayed in rough richness of little blueberry bushes, 
Scarlet, carmine, crimson, in myriads woven to- 
gether, 
Shot through with glowings of orange 
And coolings of lichen green. 
Clasped and brooched with gray rocks. 

The sky, 

As a lover lays his hand over eyes too dear. 

Gently passes across the glory 

The shadow of a cloud. 

[82] 



SHORE NOCTURNE 

Through the darkness 

The sound of sea water 

Washing at the foot of the foreland. 

Washing underneath the cliffs, 

Sucking in the crevices. 

Swelling in the clefts, and sinking. 

Washing — washing on the rocks of the foreshore. 

With even such sound must waves of space 
Troubled by the movement through its void 
Of this green living earth. 

Wash unlit margins and blind plunging chasms 
In some black barren inlet of the moon. 



[83] 



THE TIDAL POND 

Still lies my water 

Within its green enfolding of fields and woods; 

Still, from my shady narrows 

Where fresh brooks nourish me 

To my darkest deeps under the bridge 

And along the dam that holds me from the inlet. 

Against the slimed stones of the dam. 

Against the strong barred floodgate 

I lean my smooth bosom 

Softly, heavily. 

And listen — listen — 

For a sound of the outer waters. 

But only my own I hear 

Dripping from a rift in the floodgate 

Into the drained channel without; 

Hastening to follow down its windings 



[84] 



THE TIDAL POND 

Through the brown wet gleaming mud-flats of 

the basin 
Seeded with brown snails 
And trickling with runlets; 
Gathering, following 
Down the turnings of the inlet; 
Hurrying, running 
Into the mighty flow 
Through the swift and narrow opening 
To the sea. 

I may not follow, 

I may not flow. 

I wait — wait and listen. 

At last, from far off. 
Through the wet salt smell of the fiats 
Blows a small sound — 
The slipping of a ripple up the channel. 
Slowly the soft-foot tide 
Slides a film across the muddy level, 
Laps upon the snails and covers them, 

[85] 



THE TIDAL POND 



Crawls through the roots of the sedges. 

Sweeps cold and full around their stems 

Till they sway and scrape rustlingly together, 

Bow beneath the flow, and are overwhelmed. 

I feel it swell mysterious, quivering. 

Against the floodgate, — rising — rising — 

Staunching the dripping of my waters. 

Pressing urgent and strong against my leaning; 

Climbing higher, higher upon the dam 

Till a thin glimmer 

Creeps upon the stones, and deepens; 

Till the floodgate lifts open 

And with a silent cry 

The tide swirls through me, over me. — 

The waters without and my waters within are one. 

I am the inlet and the sea. 

Smooth lie our waters. 
Smooth and deep over the dam 
With the stillness of full flood, 
The calm of pause. 

[86] 



THE TIDAL POND 



Daunting calm. 

With peril and ebb and loss 

Brooding upon its face. 

Then without the floodgate 

Little eddies curl upon the surface, 

Curl and drift, suck down and vanish. 

A tremor of motion sinks within me. 

Slowly, slowly — then slowly swifter 

Our waters set toward the inlet. 

Across the dam, drawing the heart from me, 

They glide and slope and rush. 

Drawn in straight wrinkles like a stretched silken 

scarf. 
Then with fear and haste my shaken depths 
Press to escape beneath the floodgate, 
To go out with the tide to the sea, — 
Hurry, hurry in faster currents, 
Sweep under and over 
Heedless 
Till the gate dips and swings 

[87] 



THE TIDAL POND 



And falls in sudden tumult. 
Leaps, and settles in its stanchions. 
Shut close on my defeated passion. 

Over the dam then tremblingly, madly 

Still I rush with the shallow current 

Till it shrinks to thin silver glimmering on the 

stones. 
Crawling toward the inlet. 
Desperate not to be left behind. 

I am left behind. 

Still, as when the moving waters halted. 

Pressing my bosom heavily 

Against the slimed stones. 

Against the floodgate. 

Shall the flood tide be high where there is no ebb 

tide? 
Shall stillness be peace? 



[88] 




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